Season Two
by Stigma Morningstar
Summary: While Amenadiel and Lucifer search for their mother, Chloe struggles with a case that may intertwine. Post 1x13.
1. I Was a Prayer

_i am waiting 'til there's nothing left_

 _i'm a prayer, all you see is breath_

 _i am empty, i am skin and bones, i'm a ribcage_

* * *

The voice of God is not human. It is unlike anything one is able to fathom or dream. The voice is not in English, Spanish, Swahili, what have you. The voice enters through the center of the brain, not the ear, and radiates down the core to the very tip of every toenail. Contrary to popular belief, God is incredibly vocal. The fact of the matter is that very few can understand the dialect.

But Lucifer Morningstar can.

It had been painful but brief when Lucifer had entered the limbo of death. Bittersweet relief had pulsed through him as he trudged toward the gate home, and then panic as the chains of the cell lay victimized on the ground before him. He understood the voice of his father implying what had happened and what was at stake here. He had prayed- _he_ had _prayed_ -for the safety of Chloe Decker, and then his consciousness was once again placed on the ground of that warehouse… presumably to be the guardian angel of his own prayer.

He wished that was the only reason why he had been returned.

However brief, the journey from the mortal world to Limbo to Hell and back was exhausting in every aspect. Lucifer spent days in the comfort of a king sized bed and Amenadiel had stayed on his couch to continue recovery. While sleeping was not required of a supernatural being, Lucifer could easily see how "sloth" had made its way onto the Seven Deadly Sins.

Lucifer pretended like it was much more of an inconvenience than it actually was for his brother to be taking up space on his couch. One opportunity for teamwork was not going to simply outdo the centuries of rivalry. The situation remained awkward as both of them avoided speaking about Mother, but it was going to have to come up again eventually.

Unfortunately, "eventually" came on the first morning Lucifer decided to get out of bed, put on proper attire, and fix himself tea. He had barely put the kettle on when Amenadiel spoke, immediately causing a white-knuckled fist from the Devil.

"Lucifer, we need to find her."

After an eye roll that almost allowed him to view his brain, Lucifer chose an Earl Grey with a light blending of orange flavor. He strained for a witty remark but came up short this time, his silence prompting another "Lucifer" in a bark from the other room.

"Yes, I know. I know. But what's the worst that could happen?" he drawled, swinging an empty tea cup around like dramatic hand gestures would soften the reality. "There haven't been any burning buildings on the news, have there? Any school buses full of children dragged out of a lake?"

The past few days may have been a bit more tolerable had Amenadiel known how to work the television. Lucifer wasn't big on electronics, but he had absolutely _had_ to covet one of man's most brilliant and powerful brainwashing tools once he saw the sparkly price tag. Had Amenadiel witnessed that the newscast was full of only gang violence and racial intolerance as per usual, perhaps he would not have worked himself into a state of constant paranoia dreaming up all of these scenarios of destruction. They were really cluttering up his zen.

"We both know how serious this is," Amenadiel didn't bat an eye at Lucifer's irresponsibility. He had spent the last few years in Los Angeles attempting to avoid responsibility and defy orders, why stop now? "He would not have shown you the gate and sent you back without purpose. She is coming."

Lucifer had neglected to tell his brother that he wanted to believe he had been sent back purely to save Chloe. Something about that did not seem right to share. It felt intimate, caring, vulnerable… all of those plush words that came with feeling warm, gentle, sensitive human emotions. Those all were to be kept under lock and key. For his reputation, of course.

Amenadiel had a point, though, especially paired with the nauseating fact that Lucifer had maybe… potentially… perhaps… sort of offered an exchange in order of the favor for his prayer. Nothing was worse than being in debt to someone, and nothing compared to being in debt to his father. As Lucifer's sluggish brain caught up with the severity of the conversation, the tea kettle screamed to life from the stove.

"Don't worry about it, my dear brother," Lucifer chose to employ his nonchalant and pompous mask to hide the growing animal in the pit of his stomach. It was making him truly nauseous again. It was a peculiar feeling: not quite fear, but not entirely of disgust either. After filling his cup with the scalding water, he impatiently dipped the orange Earl Grey up and down as if that would make it brew faster. "In all due time, we will solve another one of Father's problems for him. But for now, learn how to use this." Lucifer paused to cross the room and pick up the television remote control from the coffee table. He threw it at Amenadiel, who caught it in a blundering hand. "Keep yourself occupied. But rest; you need to regain your strength."

Lucifer dumped his cup of tea in the sink as he headed for the exit. Who would corrupt the majesty of Earl Grey with a pathetic artificial fruit infusion?

* * *

Upon feeling the brisk morning air on his cheeks, Lucifer felt considerably more alive now not cooped up with the pessimism of his brother. He had almost decided to smile to himself before rounding the corner and coming upon Mazikeen, sitting on the sidewalk and doubled over herself. A fleeting panic danced through his blood and then subsided. Despite the recent events in which their little trio had each been compromised, Mazikeen could very much stand up for herself and her decision to curl up on a filthy sidewalk was not worth the emotional effort of assuming she was hurt. Hopefully.

"Decided to pay a visit, have you?" Lucifer called as he approached. Maze had been disturbingly absent from his life as he recovered, presumably due to who was upstairs and could not figure out how to change the channel off of Home Shopping Network. As he approached, he saw that Maze was holding something in her arms, her coat across her lap as a cushion. "What have we here?"

Mazikeen looked up at Lucifer and quickly down again at the ginger tabby cat in her arms. The cat had an unfortunate gash above its left eye that was just starting to scab over. "She's been out here for a few days. I found her when the wound was fresh. But it's getting better now."

"Have you also been out here for a few days, Maze?" Lucifer asked, receiving a nasty glare in response. "Oh, come on. It's a bloody street cat. It's filthy and basically useless. Just leave it be," was his advice, and he turned on his heel in pursuit of his original destination.

"Where are you going!?" Maze yelled after him, clearly displeased at the brevity of their first actual conversation since both he and Amenadiel had basically died. Though she wouldn't admit it, maybe she was also annoyed at his reaction to the innocent cat.

"Investigating. Don't bring that thing inside."

Maybe Maze was going soft. Lucifer allowed himself a laugh.

* * *

Following Malcolm's death, Chloe had taken a few days off of work to shake the calamity of last week. There was paperwork to finish at the office, but more troubling was the impact this had had on Trixie, and this was her priority. Trixie had stayed home from school and Chloe was not going to argue. She had been kidnapped and almost watched her mother get murdered. No amount of lounging on the couch watching Spongebob while eating peanut butter sandwiches cut into stars was influencing even the tiniest beam of light in her child's eyes, and that hurt more than anything.

Chloe was discretely searching for child psychologists on her iPad when she heard the kitchen door click open. She had sworn she had locked it. Dan no longer had a key. Her fight instincts turned on as she yelled "hello?" into the other room, sitting up and ready to bash her iPad over the head of this intruder. As quickly as her defenses had risen, Trixie had bolted off of the couch shrieking "LUCIFER!" with more delight and energy than Chloe had been able to coax out of her in days.

Upon seeing Lucifer drift around the corner with an uneasy smirk, Chloe felt her stomach and heart seize. Had he attempted to contact her? She wouldn't know, because her phone was left off. She was tense both from the surprise and because she did not know how to act. Could everything just go back to normal now? Unbeknownst to her, Lucifer was currently having the exact same internal struggle.

"Lucifer, what are you doing here? Couldn't you knock?" She sounded more rude than she had meant to, leading Lucifer to believe that "back to normal" was the way she wanted to play this episode out. Chloe realized she was being defensive because she had been frightened at the thought of an intruder, something she needed to get in check again before returning to work.

Lucifer was shuffling into the living room with his hands up to avoid touching Trixie, who was clung around his waist with incredible strength. "I've come to seek your insight, Detective, but it seems I've caught you on a day off. Or an off day, perhaps."

Chloe did look dreadful. She could not close her eyes without finding them staring down the barrel of a gun. She could not turn her phone on without seeing messages from Dan (or worse, her mother). Her ponytail was greasy and falling out, and little comfort came from laying on the couch in pajamas and fuzzy slippers but she was giving it a shot anyway. She was too tired to be embarrassed.

"Just working from home for a few days," Chloe lied, but she did not want Lucifer or anyone to know she had been rattled by almost dying. Or watching him die. Or seeing him come back to life to save her. That would have to be a conversation on another day, probably with a bottle of wine on standby. "I was going to go into the station in a bit to finish paperwork. What insight do you need that requires you to enter my home unannounced?"

Before Lucifer could formulate another thought, Trixie's hold on him was quickly heading from acceptable to annoying as she was practically dragging his pants down. Not in the mood for faking smiles, an intimidating growl of "release me, nuisance" was escaping his lips and Trixie backed away, dejected. Upon seeing the look on her face, he was immediately filled with as much regret as he would allow himself, and realized he deserved the resulting snap from Chloe as she sprang off of the couch to grab him by the arm and pull him into the kitchen. She was sent into mom mode, her anger immediately rising above her confusion.

"My daughter, was kidnapped," she said in a hushed voice, watching Trixie return to the couch in a slump from the corner of her eye. "She is scared, and depressed, and traumatized. For whatever god-unknown reason, seeing you caused the most joy she has been able to muster in days and you reject her like that? You need to be more sensitive, Lucifer."

Lucifer couldn't even argue with that. Perhaps he should have been more sensitive to Maze earlier as well, he reminisced. He listened to Chloe's reprimand with his lips pursed and was about to respond when she spoke again. "Go apologize to her or I'm not helping you with anything."

After assessing the situation and realizing he wanted to make use of Chloe's detective skills in order to locate his mother, he gave a huffy sigh through his nose and returned to the living room with 'you need to be more sensitive' echoing through his mind.

"Deeply sorry to have offended you, Trixie," he said in his most practiced, business-like voice. Trixie glanced and him and shrugged, then turned her attention back to the television. Lucifer could feel Chloe's eyes burning a hole through the back of his sport jacket. He sighed and took a seat on the couch (the furthest, opposite end of the couch from the girl), rubbing his palms over his thighs and knees. Trixie seemed only interested in the television now so he paid attention as well, attempting to follow the storyline displayed by the cartoons.

"Who is that square chap, right there?" he asked Trixie, pointing at Spongebob. He repeated the question with each character until he had gotten Trixie to introduce him to nearly all of the friends in Bikini Bottom. "So let me get this straight. He's a sponge, who lives in a pineapple. Were I to have to live in a fruit, I would surely pick a watermelon or something much larger than a pineapple. A pumpkin, even."

A laugh. Relief washed over Lucifer and he glanced at Chloe, who had finally uncrossed her arms from her chest. The look on her face was still cross, so Lucifer even went so far as to give Trixie a brief pat on the shoulder. Sensitive felt good when he could manipulate the results in his favor. Perhaps there was a benefit to it after all.

"So what are you looking for insight on?" Chloe emerged from the kitchen chewing on fruit snacks. She tossed a package to Trixie and another at Lucifer, who caught it and looked at it like he had never seen such a snack in his life. They appeared to be some sort of firm jelly, shaped like smiling fruits. There were no pineapples or watermelons, however.

"I need to track down my mother," Lucifer stated bluntly, struggling with the flimsy plastic of the wrapper until he noticed the precut notch for easy opening and felt accomplished. "I have reason to believe she is looking for me and up to no good."

"Your mother?" Chloe asked, unable to hide the shock in her voice. Lucifer continuously griped about his father, but he had never once mentioned his mother. This was both intriguing and confusing, as every time Chloe even momentarily considered believing that he really was the Devil, something brought her back to reality and made her feel ridiculous.

The Devil didn't have a mother. She was pretty sure, anyway.

"Yes, it's a long story," Lucifer brushed it off as he popped a smiling fruit in his mouth. It was orange and tasted artificially awful. "But I thought I could implore your detective skills, Detective. Maybe keep your mind off of… things." He gave a sideways nod toward Trixie.

"Well, I mean, yeah. I can try. I mean, I'm sure there's a mountain of paperwork waiting for me at my desk, but I'll try. What's her name? Do you have a last known address?"

Done with these excuses for a fruit treat, Lucifer handed the rest of his package to Trixie and stood, swooping across the room toward Chloe again. He was smirking to hide the fact that internally, he was gathering up all his courage for three syllables. "Her name is Asherah." This uncommon name was not surprising to Chloe, given that his brother was Amenadiel and he insisted his real name was Lucifer. "Her last known address is Hell."

There it was again. This was all just another layer of his weird biblical metaphor. "Alright," Chloe sounded exasperated but nodded, her arms over her chest again. "Anyway, Trixie, finish your snack and then we have to head down to the station for a minute."

Lucifer was about to scoff that Chloe had barely even acknowledged the divulgence of this sacred information when Trixie started whining. The sound was comparable to a thousand nails across chalkboards to him, but Lucifer managed to endure without covering his ears. "I don't want to go to the station. I want to stay here with Lucifer."

Subjecting himself to hanging out with a child for any amount of time was Hell in itself, but the opportunity to prove himself more sensitive was still on his mind. "Yes, Detective," he crooned, full on devilish gleam in his eye. "You go on to the station. I will be the most entertaining of babysitters."

Chloe was already on her way upstairs to freshen up and attempt to look presentable, so her harsh laugh echoed down the stairwell and throughout the whole house. "Not today," she responded in a tone that implied 'not ever.'

* * *

 _you got a sign, so i paid the ransom_

 _you felt sorry, so i felt the wrath come_

 _had a nice grip on my life 'til you twisted my arm_

* * *

"i was a prayer" property of alkaline trio


	2. Tilted

_i miss prothesis and mending souls_

 _trample over beauty while singing their thoughts_

 _i match them with my euphoria_

 _when they say "je suis plus folle que toi"_

* * *

"Doctor!" Lucifer hollered as he whipped the door of Dr. Martin's office open, sending enough force to shake the leaves of the fake tree behind it. "I've got a bone to pick. You see, the Detective says I need to be more sensitive now that-"

Linda's hard gaze was filled with fury as Lucifer realized he had walked in on another client's session without so much as knocking. The older man on the couch had been crying behind his hands until the interruption, which had shocked him into only sniffles. There was an uncomfortable silence until Lucifer assessed the situation and let out an overdramatic sigh. "Well this is bloody ironic, isn't it? Good one, Dad," he laughed dryly as he pointed up to the ceiling, then shook his head with a final chuckle. To the horror of Dr. Martin, Lucifer took a seat on the couch next to the crying man.

"There, there. Pull yourself together, mate. No use blubbering about," he rambled as he patted the man's shoulder, then looked back at the doctor. "Am I doing this correctly?"

There were few times in life when Linda Martin lost her temper, and the majority of those times had to do with Lucifer. However, with the patience and tone of a kindergarten teacher, Linda curled her fingers over her clipboard as she spoke. "Lucifer," she addressed, ignoring the utterly oblivious look on his face while he waited for his upcoming praise. "I am in session with another client right now. You need to go sit in the waiting area until I call you."

Narrowing his eyes, Lucifer considered asking why she couldn't just send this poor sod on his way and open conversation with him, but begrudgingly obliged nevertheless.

The crying man must have felt too awkward to continue on with whatever he was having a cry about, as it only took another minute or so before the door opened again and he shuffled out. "Chin up, mate," Lucifer reminded him with a smile that was much too cheerful, feeling good about how sensitive he had been in there. He stood once more and swooped in on the door, assuming the doctor had left it open as a silent invitation for him. He peered inside and knocked on the doorframe twice. "Doctor, have you freed yourself for me yet?"

"Lucifer, you are not my only client. That was completely uncalled for and violates-"

"Ah, yes, won't happen again," Lucifer rushed the acceptance as he patted the seat of the couch to make sure it wasn't wet with tears before sitting. He smiled pleasantly as he stared at the back of Linda's head until she turned around and resumed her chair. "Like I was saying, the Detective thinks I need to be more sensitive now that we were all practically murdered by a deranged cop, but I just find children so _horrid_ -"

Linda put a hand up to slow him after the murder thing and interjected a "hold on." She tapped a pen against her clipboard while she grasped the concept. "You were 'practically murdered'? You and Chloe?"

Crossing his ankle over his knee and swinging it a bit impatiently, Lucifer waved a hand in the air as if swatting a fly. "A case gone awry, I'm afraid. Her daughter was present and my brother was stabbed and anyway, it's a long story ending in my being _scolded_ over the child's ' _feelings._ '" Air quotes included.

As she usually did when examining Lucifer, Linda tried to strip down what she assumed to be a dramatic fabrication of a story and decided that the main point here was advice on how to be sensitive to children. "So you want to be more sensitive to appeal to her daughter's feelings, or because you were scolded for ignoring them?"

Tough one. "Bit of both, really," Lucifer put a finger against his chin as he pondered. "My existence is infinitely better being that I have no womb-born children and never will. However, it is important to the detective that her daughter be smothered with kindness after watching her mum shoot a lunatic in the chest several times, I suppose."

"And what's important to Chloe is important to you."

"Precisely. We're working on this whole 'trust' thing so that we can be proper partners."

"Partners?"

Lucifer's eyes flickered for a millisecond before his face melted down again into a smirk, getting what she was implying. "Partners in crime, of course. Quite literally, in fact."

Mulling it over, Linda realized she was now too absorbed in this conversation to relay it back to what _she_ wanted to talk about, which was the dysfunction of his brother and how she had been unwillingly roped into their feud. She would have to bring that up again and work it out if she wanted to clear the air and remain professional, so she wrote "brother" at the top of her page as a reminder to herself. Then, falling to his whim, she returned to the matter of the detective and her daughter. "If you respect Chloe, then you have to at least try to respect her daughter. It's not like she'll be going away any time soon."

"I get that," Lucifer sighed, slumping back against the couch cushions and drawing a heavy breath. "I just don't know what to _do_ with children. I hardly ever see one in Hell. Do they all watch dreadful animations and eat artificially flavored lumps of sugar?"

Ignoring the Hell comment Linda let out a laugh despite herself and nodded. "Basically. Children are easy to please. They like nice things and hate going to bed early. I think if you just try and make an effort to befriend her daughter, it will really make a difference in your relationship with Chloe as well."

"The partners in crime relationship," he clarified.

"Yes, of course."

Lucifer thought for a minute, wondering what he could possibly tolerate for very long that would also be acceptable for a child. Alcohol was clearly out of the picture, and he doubted she cared about his piano talents. "I don't even know where to begin with this effort, Doctor. I have no stomach for chocolate cake, or fluffy bunnies, or…" he froze as he trailed off, realizing how he could kill two birds with one sensitive stone. "That's it!" he reveled in his epiphany, jumping to his feet and heading for the door.

"Lucifer, we really should talk about…"

"Next time, dear."

Lucifer slammed the door of her office behind him and Linda took her glasses off, rubbing her forehead with the palms of her hands.

* * *

Not surprisingly, there was no Asherah Morningstar in any police database Chloe had access to. A part of her felt obligated to help Lucifer and it was a nag she couldn't stand. A proper explanation would arise for how he had survived that gunshot wound without a scratch, but that meant talking about it. She was still at the point where she wanted to let her anger out at him whenever she saw his stupid face, so until she could calm down, she could help him search for his mother for… well, the hell of it.

The precinct was quiet as eyes glanced at her and quickly looked away. Chloe kept her head up while walking to her desk, hand-in-hand with Trixie. Her stomach had been churning in a mix of anticipation and 'told you so,' but she could not find her voice to speak to anyone. Trixie immediately retreated under Chloe's desk when they arrived. As it was their first time in a public place, Chloe worried that she had felt the need to immediately hide. She would call around psychiatric offices tonight once Trixie fell asleep.

There were files on her desk from the entire case, starting with the very first murder of the Satanist. Chloe glanced through her preliminary notes, feeling sicker as they stopped with the murder of the priest and Lucifer's escape from Lux. She would have to relive from that point on, as she always put herself back in the scenario mentally to write a thorough report.

Dan's preliminary notes were also in the file, as well as his interview after turning himself in. When Chloe had finally turned her phone back on an hour before, the only message from him was days old and said simply, "don't worry."

Glancing through the interview was not helping the green in her face, so that was when she had decided to take a detour and search for Lucifer's mother, mainly just to say she had. She was switching from the databases to simply Google when she heard a "Decker" barked behind her and turned in her chair.

"Didn't expect to see you back so soon," it was the chief, cup of coffee in hand.

Chloe swallowed hard, trying not to look intimidated, though she was feeling like a tiny, sick mouse. "Just wanted to wrap up this case and get started on the next." With Trixie still under her desk, she was silently praying the chief would not mention Dan, or bring up-

"We still need to review your decision to succumb to the ransom of a suspect. Alone, on top of that."

Damn it. Chloe pretended to look very busy with her papers for a moment to steal a glance at Trixie. Finally, she nodded. "You're right. It was a rash decision." Her words collapsed in a sigh. There was really no justifying her decision, especially not with Trixie right at her knees.

The chief looked over her before his stare softened. "Decker, if you need until Monday…"

"No," Chloe snapped immediately. She had spent much too long making her name in the force for everyone to write her off as weak and shaken now. "I don't need any more days off. I'll have this report done tonight, and keep me posted for the next case."

Wordlessly, the chief gave a nod and a shrug and finally left Chloe in peace. Fueled with a new adrenaline to write this report, she flipped the file open and attempted to make use of an omniscient technique by pretending like it was not about her.

"Mommy?" Trixie piped up suddenly, finally taking her face out of the game she had been playing on Chloe's cell phone. "I don't need any more days off either."

Chloe looked down at her daughter with a tilted head and a frown. She couldn't really deny Trixie's request after the example she was setting. She sighed with the tiniest of smiles and brushed a bit of Trixie's hair off of her forehead with her fingertips. "You're my kid," she gave in with a nod. "Let me just finish up here. We'll grab dinner on the way home and pack your backpack for tomorrow."

Her bit of anger-filled adrenaline subsided and she was once again exhausted. Nonetheless, she picked up a pen and returned her attention to the file. Her visual focus was somewhere in the middle of an empty page as she backtracked her brain to the night at Lux. Following Dan's lead to the brewery, running into Lucifer, feeling guilty for the millisecond she considered him a suspect, Dan turning himself in, Trixie calling… gunshots…

Her heart jumped and she looked under her desk to make sure her daughter was still there, unaware of how long she had sat there daydreaming. "Mommy," Trixie chimed, looking up with a small, hopeful grin. "I like Lucifer. He's mean sometimes, but I think he's a good guy."

Chloe jolted out of her reverie again and had to keep from rolling her eyes out of habit. His charm even worked on children, it seemed. "I'm glad you think so," was the only polite thing she could think of as she closed the file again. Her focus and motivation was gone. She shook her computer's mouse to bring the screen out of sleep mode. The screen was still on Google and she quickly remembered her current favorite distraction.

'Asherah Morningstar' again yielded no worthy results. Backspacing, the first name only brought up a research page.

 _Asherah - Athirat - Ashtarath_

 _Goddess of Motherhood and Fertility_

 _Recognized as the consort of God._

 _Said to have created 70 children, most notably archangels Gabriel, Samael, Raphael, and Michael.*_

"Can we have pizza for dinner?"

Blinking quickly to mentally absorb the information, Chloe exited the page when Trixie asked. "Let's go," Chloe said as she gathered her things, grabbing Trixie's hand as they left the cubicle.

* * *

"I'm going to start charging you rent if you continue to freeload on my couch," Lucifer warned Amenadiel the moment he walked into his apartment and found the angel exactly where he had left him. "I mean honestly, the rent here is already outstanding and now you're sapping the electricity as well."

"Electricity?" Amenadiel repeated, sitting up and turning the television off so it wouldn't appear that he was enjoying _Judge Judy_ as much as he was.

Lucifer sighed and threw his hands up in exasperation. "Must I personally introduce you to every facet of human life in the 21st century, brother? Electricity, powering up your wonderful new pastime. If you're going to stick around on earth, you've got to start learning these things." Wandering through to peer into his bedroom, he turned toward Amenadiel again. "Anyway, where is Maze?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Amenadiel sighed and winced at a pain in his side. Though the wound was healed, demon weapons forged in Hell left lingering injury. Even worse was the mental anguish of showing pain and weakness in front of Lucifer.

"She didn't come up? She was lounging around on the pavement downstairs just this morning."

"No, she didn't. I figured you left to track her down."

Lucifer scoffed. "I don't 'track down' my employees." Though it felt strange to refer to her as only that, his brain made the connection to Lux for the first time in a few days. Perhaps she was hidden away there. Hopefully she was running the business. He made a mental note to also tip the cleaning staff handsomely upon his return, given that he did not find any remaining glass shards anywhere. "I was out investigating Mum's whereabouts while you were allowing your brain to melt into the plasma screen."

"You went to see the detective."

"Well, yes."

Amenadiel could not hide his smirk as he raised a brow, inciting a quick eye roll from Lucifer. "And how did that go?"

Lucifer battled the strange and sudden urge to pour out everything he was thinking by faking a toothy grin. "Business as usual, I suppose. She'll come through on a lead, I'm sure."

"Aren't you worried about opening that can of worms? Introducing her to… the family?"

Lucifer thought for a moment. He could literally sit Chloe down with the most stoic of expressions and explain every detail of his existence for the past millennia in grotesque specifics and she would still find a way to deny it. He had been resurrected in front of her, for father's sake, and yet that miracle had been overshadowed earlier that day by the fact that he had not knocked before entering her home. "It is what it is," he shrugged, hands in his pockets as he drifted toward the picture window to stare out of it dramatically. Out of every human emotion he had had a taste of, sadness was by far the most loathsome.

* * *

 _but i'm actually good, can't help it if we're tilted_

 _i am actually good, can't help it if we're tilted_

* * *

 *** biblical information may be altered or skewed for fictional purposes**

"tilted" property of christine and the queens


	3. Spirits

_i got guns in my head and they won't go_

 _spirits in my head and they won't go_

 _but the gun still rattles, the gun still rattles_

* * *

"Just the pussycat I was looking for," Lucifer strolled into Lux, glancing around briefly to inspect the cleanliness as he approached Maze at the bar. She was scowling, swirling a glass of whiskey in her hand.

"Finally got the place cleaned up and we haven't had a single customer. Word must have gotten out about someone getting _murdered_ here. _Again_ ," she stared him down, clinking her long, black fingernails against the glass. Lucifer raised his brows at how much it sounded like she genuinely cared about the state of the business.

"Again?"

"Delilah?"

Ignoring that, Lucifer quickly made up an excuse as the corners of his mouth couldn't help but pull into a frown. "It will blow over, my dear. If not, we'll turn it into a ghost story," he decided. Humans did love supernatural tales, after all. "Anyway, I've come to find you because I need that mangy cat you rescued."

Mazikeen looked panicked for a second before her poker face returned. "You told me to leave it be."

Lucifer chuckled, sitting down at the bar across from her and motioning for his own glass. "You can't tell me you actually obliged," he sniffed, actually hoping she had not. "You were cradling that awful thing like a baby."

Maze really didn't know why she was attached to this cat, but after she had cleaned up its face when she found it outside of Lucifer's apartment building, it had started following her everywhere. She wasn't sure she could get rid of it even if she tried. Eyeing Lucifer, she gave him a suspicious look before setting her glass down. She walked further down the counter and retrieved the tiny kitten, where it had been sleeping soundly in her jacket on top of the ice machine. She held the cat close in her arms as she brought it back to Lucifer, setting it down in front of him.

"Well, that has to be a health code violation," he mentioned, maintaining eye contact with the cat. He found most animals useless and this one was especially creeping him out. He tried moving his shoulders from side to side and the creature would not break their gaze.

"What do you want with it?" Maze picked up her drink again to cover her face. She was trying to hide her overprotective sneer.

"Well," Lucifer was seeing how long he could remain in a staring contest with this tiny demon. "Trixie-you remember Trixie-is a bit shaken up from the week's events, so I thought I would bring her a friend. Has it got a name?"

If Lucifer thought he was just going to waltz in here and give her new cat to a child, he was sorely mistaken. She was gritting her teeth behind the glass. "No, she doesn't. What events are you even talking about?"

Bored with the staring contest, Lucifer attempted to reach out and touch the kitten's head. It went from sweet and innocent to pissed off in a second, taking a swipe at his hand with claws out. He noticed a scratch form and tiny droplets of blood litter down the side of his hand. This sign of mortality scared him because it had hurt, and Chloe was not in the vicinity. If his resurrection had eliminated his immortality, he was going to be furious. "I died, Maze," he informed her, licking the blood droplets away and glaring at the stupid animal. "A mortal death. Not recommended, by the way. Blood everywhere, a horrible mess." Her jaw dropped. "But Dad brought me back."

"Brought you back?" Mazikeen was hurt and annoyed. Her heart clenched at the potential that she would have been able to return home and it was taken from her once again. "He's been trying to get you to return to Hell for weeks and he keeps you here? Why?"

"Seems I've got a new purpose," Lucifer mused nonchalantly, sipping at whatever Maze had poured into his glass. He did not feel like explaining further or inviting someone else to get on his case about finding Mum, so he stopped there. "I think we shall bestow it the name… Lucipurr. Grand, no?"

"Clever," Mazikeen rolled her eyes. "She's _mine_. I will name her. And I can't believe you're just brushing over the fact that you died, and now you've got debt to pay. How does this not bother you?"

Lucifer was thoroughly amused by Maze's attachment to the cat. He just didn't understand the human fascination with pets that she had somehow fallen into. "Just a bit. It will be over soon enough, and then we can return to our beloved indulgence and luxury as before."

"What, are you giving up on your Civilian Consultant gig?"

"Not quite. Now that Detective Dou… _Daniel_ is locked away, the force will need my help more than ever!"

Mazikeen's eyes widened and she groaned, gathering their empty glasses and busying herself with adding them to the wash. She didn't even have the energy to ask about Dan. "Thanks for making me the last to know _everything_ ," she grumbled, almost cracking a glass with the annoyed force she applied to put it away.

Lucifer threw his head back and gave a hearty laugh, scaring the newly named Lucipurr in the process. "That's what happens when you storm off for days, my dear."

"I was _here_ ," she seethed, her voice rising. "Cleaning up your mess, as always. It's not like I was hiding."

"And you were also lingering outside my flat without popping in. Afraid to speak to Amenadiel, were you?"

"Shut up," Mazikeen flared her eyes. Lucifer took the disobedience in stride and shrugged innocently. Perhaps he had intended to strike a nerve.

"I'll be back tonight to oversee the business," he told her as he stood. He looked around behind the bar, uncovering a sturdy box that had once been used to deliver wine bottles but was now housing cleaning towels. He dumped the contents on the counter and put the box next to the cat, who seemed to be literally glaring at him. "Lucipurr and I shall be on our way now."

Mazikeen offered no help as Lucifer attempted to put the cat in the box and it kept swiping at him. He jumped away each time with a disgusted look on his face as Lucipurr kept growling. "You better bring her back," Mazikeen sighed and plopped the cat in the box for him, including her coat for comfort.

* * *

Trixie had seemed fine when Chloe had dropped her off at school. She might have even been _too_ fine, but that could have been her overprotectiveness making her suspicious. After returning home, realizing it to be her first moment alone in days, she locked the kitchen door and immediately started weeping. She cried as she put a kettle on for tea, she cried on the kitchen counter, she cried on the couch in the living room. She cried for Trixie, she cried for Dan, she cried for Lucifer. And though she hated herself for it, she also cried for Malcolm a little bit too.

Her report was still not finished. After crying enough to fill her tear quota for the next two centuries, she could not find the strength to lift that manila folder from the kitchen table. It had been there since she and Trixie returned from pizza dinner the night before, and maybe it would stay there forever, collecting dust. She had never not completed a report before. Maybe she could get a pass with this one.

Chloe was pouring her third cup of tea when there came two loud knocks on the door. She immediately set her mug down and grabbed the largest chef's knife she could find at the moment's notice. Holding it up at the ready, she took silent steps forward before the lock clicked open effortlessly and she watched the door swing open in horror.

"For father's sake, I knocked this time!" Lucifer cried at Chloe's defense mode as he walked in carrying a large box. "Is this my reward for attempting to be more compassionate? Walking in to you wielding a kitchen knife all around my face?"

"Lucifer," Chloe breathed, lowering the knife. Color returned to her face for the first time that day, but it was blush from embarrassment.

"Detective, honestly," he sighed as he set the box down on the kitchen table, on top of the report folder. He advanced toward her slowly, grabbing her wrist gently to pry the knife from her clenching fist. Taking care not to touch the blade, he put it back in a drawer and looked to Chloe. "Are you alright, then?"

His eyes seemed so sincerely concerned, it made a lump rise in Chloe's throat. She swallowed hard, hoping her tear ducts were still dried out from earlier. "Yeah," she lied, nodding her head quickly. "You just startled me. It's fine. What did you bring?" She was thankful for the easy subject change.

Sensing her desire to move on, Lucifer waved her over to the table so they could peer into the box together. The kitty was curled up in a leather jacket that could only be Maze's, pressed into the corner desperately. "Maze rescued this cat. I so graciously named it 'Lucipurr.' Hilarious, I know. I thought I would bring it over to show Trixie," he boasted at his bright idea, puffing his chest to receive his praise for being so thoughtful.

"Uh," was all Chloe said as she looked at Lucipurr. The cat's big, green eyes were staring her down relentlessly. "Trixie decided to go to school today, actually. I guess you can bring it back later?" she suggested, which wasn't really the reaction he had been hoping for. In fact, it almost sounded like she was trying to get rid of him.

"Children like animals, don't they? I find this one a little unsettling but Maze seems to adore-"

"Lucifer," Chloe interrupted him, her watery eyes returning. Lucifer really didn't deal with sadness or tears very well, so he stared at her with a confused expression until she croaked out, "you died."

"I did, yes," he agreed, putting a hand over his stomach where a bullet hole should have been.

"Then how are you here?"

Lucifer sighed through his nose and shifted back and forth in his shoes uncomfortably. "Dad… wanted me to stay."

Chloe was locking eyes with him so intently, she felt like she could tear through his soul. If he had one, of course. "Dad," she repeated skeptically, knowing where this was going. "God?"

"Indeed," Lucifer was staring right back at her, though he furrowed his brow when she began to look cross.

"It's not _possible_. I _watched_ Malcolm shoot you," she began to tear up again, balling her fists so she wouldn't physically lash out at him. "I _watched_ you fall, and-"

"I _know_ , Detective," Lucifer was getting angry as well, so his words kept flowing out with no filter. "I was laying there dying, and so I said 'hey Dad, if you protect Chloe, I'll do whatever you want,' and then I died for a bit and he shared the terms of his deal and then he sent me back," he explained flippantly to avoid expressing any emotion behind it.

Silence. "What?" Chloe gasped eventually, a single tear dripping down her cheek. She couldn't wrap her head around it. Maybe the bullet had missed. Maybe he had just pretended. She hadn't been close enough to see any blood, after all-

Suddenly, Lucifer placed his hands on Chloe's shoulders, leaning in inches from her sniffling face. "I was sent back to protect you," he said clearly, causing more unwanted tears to slip out. Lucifer sighed gently and used his thumbs to brush away the tears, then stood up straight and smoothed the front of his jacket, looking around the room uncomfortably. "I cannot be any more honest. If that's any comfort at all." He cleared his throat. "Moving along, any word about my mum yet?"

Chloe almost punched him. How could he dive into something that she presumed was supposed to be sweet and then completely write it off and change the subject? Maybe he thought he was sparing her dignity. She gathered herself, standing up a bit straighter and wiping her eyes on her sleeve. With a final sniffle, she cleared her throat as well. "No, nothing yet." She managed to pick up her tone a bit. Business as usual.

"Pity," Lucifer shrugged, and they were both silently relieved to hear Chloe's cell phone ringing. She stepped away to answer it.

It was the lieutenant, requesting her to meet the chief at a new crime scene straight away. She glanced at the clock on the stove and hesitated before accepting and telling her to send the address to her phone. She was wary of turning down her first potential case after the conversation she had had with the chief the day before, no matter her current mental state. After hanging up, she scrolled through her contacts, realizing there was not a single person she trusted with picking up Trixie from school.

"Are we onto our next case?" Lucifer grinned as he looked over her shoulder at her phone screen. He couldn't wait to get back on a case, really, half so he could rub it in the faces of the other cops that had wrongfully suspected him of murder, and half so he had a reason to procrastinate on attempting to locate Mother.

"I need to go to a crime scene, yes. But Trixie gets off of school in an hour…" she trailed off, sounding genuinely stumped for a solution. It sounded to Lucifer like she was definitely implying _he_ should be the one to go pick up her spawn.

"Consider it taken care of," he said in his best fake-cheerful voice before he could decide not to. "I will pick up Trixie from school."

Chloe raised a brow but could not find the urge to laugh. "Really?"

"Truly," he confirmed, shoving his hands in his pockets so his arms were stiffened straight. He maintained a convincing grin as his fingers curled in his pockets. "Crime scenes are typically a bore, anyway. Call me when you get to the interrogating people part and I will be of service."

Chloe considered hugging him for a minute, but decided the current position of his arms was too awkward to make it quick or swift enough. Trustworthy was not exactly the word that came to mind when looking at Lucifer, but Chloe eerily recalled Trixie's random conversation the night before. ' _I think he's a good guy.'_ "Thank you," she said instead of trying to hug him, grabbing her purse from the living room and digging through it for her keys. "Bring her right back here, please."

"She will be in the safest hands," Lucifer promised, waiting until Chloe had walked out and closed the door behind her to let go of his positive demeanor. His shoulders slumped forward and he sighed. Out of the corner of his eye, giant green ones were staring him down. "Don't look at me like that," he scolded the cat. "Bloody Hell."

* * *

 _and i don't want a never-ending life_

 _i just want to be alive while i'm here_

* * *

"spirits" property of the strumbellas


	4. Lucifer, I Am

_we are the children, the horrible children, things that you don't understand_

 _pieces are falling, we are all tortured by pain and destruction_

 _who will save us against satan?_

* * *

The newest crime scene was in the back stairwell near the kitchen inside of a posh hotel. Those with sensitive stomachs could not stay within ten feet, and the rest of the investigators were miserably uncomfortable. Needless to say, room service would be on pause for a while.

Once Chloe arrived, parked, and showed her badge to cross the tape, she looked for the chief. Most of the officers were standing outside the stairwell's emergency exit, and it appeared that only one forensic analyst was inside investigating the body found on the stairs. Upon seeing Chloe storming through, most of the officers exchanged awkward glances and turned to ignore her. Her face was warm, but she put on a determined mask, also known as "bitch face."

"What's the scene?" she asked when she found the chief, putting latex gloves on. The chief turned to her with a wary look.

"It's brutal," he admitted, which was probably why non-essentials were already checking out and leaving the area. "Probably the worst I've seen in… well. The victim is Dick Whibley," he told her, reading off of a clipboard that he was still jotting notes on. "63 years old, on a business trip from San Antonio. He's the CEO of Whibley's, a popular fast food chain down south."

Before she could enter through the emergency exit and start her own examination of the scene, the chief cleared his throat loud enough to make her turn around again. "Decker, just…" he started, but, afraid of getting snapped at once again, he bit his tongue. "I'd suggest it be brief."

Ignoring her growing anxiety, she walked into camera flashes. Upon witnessing the body, she stumbled back a step and looked away. Mr. Whibley was slumped back against the stairs, pools of blood forming trails like paint drips down each step. One of his shoes lay feet away, and the pressed white shirt that accompanied his designer suit was now soaked in red. The most unsettling part was the point of injury. Visible between the folds of the ripped blouse, Mr. Whibley suffered one laceration across his chest and another diagonally down the length of his torso. Bits of entrails escaped the skin and it was hard to imagine what sort of weapon or person could accomplish this behavior. Chloe felt lightheaded after only seconds of standing there.

Escaping outside again, she discretely took deep breathes to subside her nausea. "Time of death?" she asked the chief, managing to allow her voice to crack only once.

The body had been discovered twenty minutes before, but the amount of blood lost suggested the assault had been over an hour ago. Chloe took quick notes on a small notepad, scouring the area for security cameras. She was noting positions of lenses and scribbling furiously when the chief approached her again. "Decker…" he cleared his throat. "Nobody wants this case."

She got what he was implying, but it still made her blood run cold. "I wonder why," she quipped, flipping the notepad shut again. "I'm going to the management office to run security footage at the points of entry. Call me once the autopsy results are definite."

Before Chloe could part, she met the uncomfortable attempt at the chief's sympathetic gaze. "Let me know if you need anything."

"Will do," Chloe responded in a daze. She rounded the front of the building, charging toward the management office. Before checking in to review the security footage, however, she stopped in one of the hotel's impeccably pristine restrooms to vomit her own guts out.

* * *

Having not wanted a filthy animal alongside him in his immaculate Corvette, it was convenient that he had chosen one of his cars with a backseat now that he volunteered to pick up the small human from class. When Lucifer put the cat box in the backseat of his car again, it started howling and screaming at him. Gritting his teeth, he enjoyed the beautiful melody of cat screeching for the entire ride to Trixie's school. Then, as he was a bit early, he had to sit there and continue listening to it until Trixie was let out of class. Near the end of the wait, he turned and could not prevent his devil face from showing itself. " _Enough!_ " he bellowed, eyes still glowing red as the cat quieted and began another angry staring contest with him. "This is what I get," he swore under his breath, his eyes moving to the sky.

After the shrill school bell sounded, Lucifer glanced in the car's rearview mirror to make sure his face had returned to its acceptable human form before exiting the vehicle and walking toward the crosswalk. Children ran past him screaming and pushing each other, and he looked at each of them with his nose scrunched as if they were all literally covered in feces. He was standing up straight and rigid near the bus lanes when he heard a small "hi Lucifer." He looked down and around, and once he saw that it was Trixie, his heart fell a little. She had not even attempted to cling onto his legs in her usual greeting, and he did not know why that gave him any emotional response at all.

"Hello," he responded blandly to the little girl, waving to a group of mothers who were flocked together, pointing at him discreetly and whispering while waiting for their spawn. "Let's get this over with, shall we?"

"Mommy called my teacher and said you were coming to get me, so it wasn't really a surprise," Trixie informed him, as if he would intentionally wait for her without Chloe knowing as a fun way to spend his time.

"How _dare_ she," he humored her anyway, mostly to amuse himself. He plucked Trixie's purple butterfly backpack from her shoulders and slung it over his to carry it for her, though the childish style clashed horribly with his suit.

As they approached the crosswalk, Trixie stopped at the curb and stuck her hand up in the air at him. Lucifer continued on into the street, but Trixie wouldn't budge, flailing her hand around at him. "What?" he called back to her.

"We have to hold hands to cross the street!" she yelled back, giving him a look that emphasized she was not stepping onto the asphalt unless he was holding her hand.

"Bloody Hell," Lucifer hissed under his breath and walked back to her, grabbing her hand between his thumb and forefinger in the way one might pick up someone else's used tissue. "Aren't you a bit old to be holding hands?" he grunted, tugging her along so this would be over sooner.

"You always have to hold hands when you cross the street. That's Daddy's rule."

Lucifer was annoyed at how much he felt like a dad right then, carrying her hideous purple bookbag and connected to her hand. "What if I'm crossing the street on my own? Have I got to hold my own hand, then?"

"Yep," was Trixie's confident answer, eliciting the smallest laugh from his lips. How asinine.

Lucifer opened the back door of the car for her and threw her backpack in before letting her follow. "I did bring an actual surprise, however, since my grand arrival was ruined by your mother," he gestured toward the box. Trixie looked in and Lucifer watched her face spread into a big grin at the sight of Lucipurr, which he supposed was the entire reason for bringing the dreadful creature in the first place.

"Aww, kitty," she cooed at it as Lucifer got in the driver's seat and started the car. "I always wanted a kitty. But Daddy is allergic."

As Trixie reached into the box to pet Lucipurr, Lucifer almost yelled at her not to, thinking of his scratch from earlier. Luckily, the cat seemed to like her a lot more than it liked him. He began to drive back to her house, glancing in the rearview mirror often to make sure the cat wasn't attacking. "Got Dad on the brain today, have you?"

Trixie nodded. "I miss him," she shrugged, her voice quiet as she stroked Lucipurr's fur gently. "Mommy won't tell me when he's coming home. Do you know?"

Lucifer felt a little guilty for bringing it up, his grip on the steering wheel tightening as visions of Dan in a prison cell danced through his brain. Perhaps those visions would have brought him joy at one point. "No, I'm afraid I don't know either," he admitted, and the three sat in stifling silence for the rest of the ride.

* * *

' _When will you return? I am literally bored out of my skull and your spawn needs feeding,'_ Lucifer texted Chloe as he stood in front of her open refrigerator, adding the angry devil face emoji at the end of the message. He had managed to withstand Trixie for a grand total of two hours now, and it was mainly due to the girl's transfixion with the ginger cat. While she was occupied, Lucifer was free to snoop, though he mainly stayed around the kitchen. Chloe's bedroom upstairs was the most daring of temptations, but Trixie was guaranteed to tattle on him if he set foot on the staircase. Or worse, she could find him elbow deep in her mum's panty drawer, so he wouldn't take the chance.

Instead, he had sat himself at the kitchen table and browsed through the notorious case file. He noticed it was incomplete and spent an hour finishing it. He left out the part about his divine resurrection, though his handwriting was such literal shit that nobody would be able to decipher a thing he wrote anyway. He could have divulged the secrets of the universe and it would be glanced at, regarded as chicken scratch, and filed away forever. But it looked done, and he had completed his second good deed for the day. That was already two too many.

"Lucifer," Trixie appeared as he was closing the folder. She was hugging the cat against her chest like it was a stuffed animal, letting its legs dangle. It looked annoyed. "I'm hungry."

Eating was purely just enjoyment for him, as he never experienced the sensation of human hunger. He rarely even thought about food, which was why he had forgotten it was about time for the human child to have dinner. He reached into his back pocket to fish out a credit card from his wallet, holding it out to her. "There. Order a pizza."

"I had pizza for dinner last night."

"So that means you can't have it again?"

"Yep."

Lucifer sighed and put the credit card back in his wallet, getting to his feet. He was pretty sure he had seen other sorts of take out menus in one of the drawers during his previous snoop. "Can't you cook?" Trixie asked, watching him bustle through junk mail and coupons.

"I can, but I'm not going to."

"Why not?"

He took a deep breath to keep from losing his patience. "Because that's your mum's job."

"Nuh-uh. Daddy cooks for me all the time."

He didn't know why, but his heart beat loud in his throat every time she mentioned Dan. He felt bad that Dan was currently absent from her life, but like Hell if he was going to serve as a surrogate father until then, cooking her dinner and reading her books before sleep and whatnot. "Fine," he gave in _this one time_ , which was when he had opened the refrigerator, found it depressingly empty, and texted Chloe.

"Check the freezer," Trixie suggested as she hopped up on a stool at the kitchen island. Sure enough, there were enough microwaveable freezer meals to last through the apocalypse.

After another back and forth banter that was becoming too customary for his liking, a dinner conclusion was met and Lucifer found himself standing irritably in front of the microwave, watching the timer go off to signal that the dinosaur-shaped lumps of fried chicken matter were properly heated through. Chloe had responded to his text with '30 minutes' and he wanted to start the timer again for that.

"Lucifer, do you have magic powers?" Trixie asked with her mouth full of food. Lucipurr sat on the counter next to her, staring intently at the plate of chicken nuggets. The entire sight was absolutely revolting.

"I do not," Lucifer responded without looking up. He was reading the back of the bag of chicken nuggets to determine what percentage of it was actually meat. He felt like sending Chloe another nasty text as to why she would even allow this edible garbage into her home.

"One time I asked Mommy if you were a magician, and then she thought if you were, you wouldn't tell anyway," Trixie mused. Lucifer cocked his head at her and had to fight the urge to smirk.

"I'm not a magician, I'm the devil," he explained, thinking the clarification might frighten her into being less obsessed with him. He had no qualms about sharing that tidbit with anyone else, obviously, as he had spent his entire life in Los Angeles broadcasting it, but it did feel strange to announce it directly to a child.

Trixie seemed unphased, however. "No you're not, you don't have any horns."

"You sound just like your mum."

"Did you find your mom yet?" Trixie asked, and Lucifer wondered how she could have possibly known he was meant to be searching for Asherah before remembering she had been on the couch watching cartoons during the initial conversation with Chloe. Therefore, she was probably not a part of a conspiracy organized by his father to keep him focused on fulfilling his new responsibility. Probably.

"No, I have not."

"Is she a devil too?"

Lucifer swallowed hard. "Something like that."

"Do devils have to go poop?"

"Why do you ask so many questions?" Lucifer managed to keep his volume down, but his temper was rising. "There's only one devil, me, and no, I do not have to 'go poop.' Finish your food," he pointed at her plate to end the conversation.

He was daydreaming about laying in bed nursing an entire bottle of whiskey when Chloe finally shuffled through the door, somehow managing to look even worse than when she had left. "Evening, Detective," he growled, mentally exhausted from spending way too long with her bothersome, curious child.

"Mommy, Lucifer said he doesn't go poop," Trixie announced like she had been waiting all day to tell someone. Lucifer narrowed his eyes at her in a death glare before flashing a toothy smile at Chloe.

"Children are so enjoyable and charming. Might I offer to radiate a plate of microwaved chicken particles for supper?" he changed the subject before he could say anything that was insensitive, tugging the bag of nuggets out of the freezer to wiggle it around. Tempting.

"No, thank you," Chloe finally deposited herself at the kitchen table. Lucifer waited with anticipation for her to notice he had completed her report, but she did not even bat an eye at it. After sending Trixie to her room to start working on her homework, Chloe allowed herself to rest her head against the table.

"Rough day?" Lucifer felt awkward just standing there in front of the microwave so he approached slowly, much the same way Lucipurr was suspiciously pawing at the remnants on Trixie's dinner plate. He sat at the table across from her and folded his hands in his lap, still smiling because the report he had worked _so hard_ on was right there between them.

"To say the least," Chloe sighed and looked up, resting her face against a fist. "Just… really gruesome. Might need you to come to work the case tomorrow," she suggested nonchalantly. "Thank you for hanging out with Trixie. I'm going to go soak in the bath until I'm a prune."

"Why did you invite me to the boring option? Work is incredibly less enjoyable than your bath." For some reason, it felt strange to make passive advances at her when she was tired and depressed. He understood humans held onto emotion longer than he did, but Trixie seemed just fine. Chloe was just… different, and it was no fun to drop innuendos on someone sad. She did not even react to his complaint, but she did immediately grab her cell phone the second a text buzzed in her pocket. It was a photo from the autopsy lab, who had just uncovered the murder weapon. Apparently it had been lodged _inside_ of the body.

"This looks so familiar," Chloe thought out loud, but maybe her brain was fuzzy from watching security footage all afternoon. Lucifer was already attempting to crawl over the table to get a look at her phone when she handed it over to show him. Unaware it was the tool used to slaughter and gut a man just hours ago, he gave the picture a puzzled look.

"To be quite honest, Detective, it looks like a demon blade forged in Hell."

* * *

 _he lay down among lions, you confronted the demons_

 _somehow it's a part of me, and i promise_

 _lucifer, i am. lucifer, i am._

* * *

"lucifer, i am" property of michale graves


	5. Trash

_you remind me that seven sins are deadly_

 _you used to baptize me when i wasn't ready_

 _i think of you whenever i see fire in the sky_

* * *

Despite how shaky the last week had been for everyone he talked to on a regular basis, Lucifer was pleased to learn that he had not lost his charm. The moment he and Amenadiel had entered the precinct, the lady officers had flocked to the two men. After some lighthearted insults at his brother's expense, Lucifer had won the attention of the majority and Amenadiel had backed away to make himself a cup of coffee. It was then that Chloe had arrived to work, done a double-take at the stoic man she vaguely recognized by the Keurig, and then noticed the gaggle of giddy women around the man sitting on top of her desk.

She tried to shuffle in without making herself too obviously known, but once he spotted her, it was clear that Lucifer had come here for her and not to make friends with other lady cops. The group of women dispersed on her arrival, which probably would have happened whether or not Lucifer was present. She, once again, felt like the plague of the department.

"Detective!" Lucifer was much too cheery for this hour of the morning, or for any time, really. "Running late, are we?"

"I had to drop Trixie off at school," she huffed, setting her bag down on her desk and sifting through her mailbox tray without looking at him. "Lucifer, why did you bring your brother here?"

As if he had overheard, Amenadiel immediately swooped into the conversation, sipping on his overly sweetened cup. "Why, he's here to examine the evidence, of course," Lucifer replied, patting his brother on the shoulder while he swung his legs to and fro from the desk.

"Which evidence?"

"The demon blade forged in Hell, Detective. Bit ironic to have him in contact with one so soon, but I digress. I can't inspect it myself because I won't have a reaction to it, but he most certainly will."

"Do you really have to refer to it as a 'demon blade forged in Hell' every time you mention it?"

"Yes, actually."

Chloe sighed and did everything she could to keep her eyes off of the men. Lucifer she ignored out of habit to spite him, but she felt a strange attraction to his brother that she could never place and it embarrassed her. She tucked a strand of hair that had fallen from her messy bun and thumbed through her bag for her current case file.

"Did you sleep last night, Detective?" Though Lucifer sounded genuinely concerned, she didn't need to raise any more alarms, and certainly not in front of his handsome brother.

"I'm fine," had become her standard lie. "I can't just let you have the knife, it's already processed in evidence."

"Well then take it out!"

Chloe glared at him. "They literally have a guard standing in front of the evidence room now. It's not so easy to just _take stuff out_ anymore." Her look was daring a retort.

He waved his hands, exasperated. "Well, we've got to see it. If it's a true demon blade forged in Hell and it's not Mazikeen's, we've got a problem much larger than you realize, my dear."

"What kind of problem, pray tell?"

Lucifer swallowed hard but managed to keep his aloof expression from hardening. He glanced at Amenadiel and both men looked at the floor uncomfortably. "Well, the only other being on this planet who could possess such a thing would be my mother."

"What would the queen of Hell have to gain by murdering a fast food CEO?"

"She's not the queen of Hell. What a laugh," Lucifer said with absolutely no humor whatsoever. "She's… It doesn't matter. The point being, we've got to-"

"Decker!" The lieutenant barked across the room. In Chloe's moment of distraction, Lucifer skillfully swiped her keys from her bag's front pocket and passed them to Amenadiel, hoping there was a key fob on there that could be of use in protected evidence rooms.

"Good morning, Olivia," Lucifer ignited his charm as Amenadiel slid away. The lieutenant was momentarily enchanted by his smile before she was back to business. Chloe could barely contain her eye roll.

"The CEO of Heaven's Waters resort was just found in one of the hotel's guest suites," Olivia explained, showing a picture of the body from her phone. It looked like the picture had been edited with a blood-tinted filter. Chloe shied away, but Lucifer leaned in to take a better look.

"What a dreadful name for a resort. And that wallpaper…"

"Another CEO implies a spree," Chloe said over him at the same time, already packing her bag again and slinging it over her shoulder. "I'll head over there now to investigate. We can compare facial recognition with the security footage from yesterday."

Lucifer hopped up off of the desk, rubbing his hands together. "Deckerstar, back on the hunt!" he declared.

"Not if you ever say that again," Chloe grumbled as the lieutenant handed over a post-it with the coordinates. Chloe searched her bag for her keys. Not finding them there, she patted her pockets and looked under the desk. She was seriously losing it.

"Looking for these?" Lucifer jingled them in front of her and she snatched them away, glancing at Amenadiel, who seemed to have reappeared out of thin air. "My brother will be accompanying us on our journey, fully aware that he is being an awkward third wheel."

"Great. Let's go."

While Chloe stormed off, Lucifer stopped Amenadiel for a moment. "Verdict?"

"I'm not positive. It was in a plastic bag. I took a picture on my cell phone to show Mazikeen."

Lucifer neglected to tell him that he had not told Maze anything about their mother's escape, and instead let out a laugh. "You've gotten yourself a cell phone, have you? Do follow me on Instagram."

* * *

Lucifer composed himself in the same way he did at every crime scene: selectively interested. The hotel overlooking the resort was grandiose, stationed over an immaculate private beach lining electric blue water. Chloe determined a week's stay here would easily forfeit her entire annual salary. Lucifer had plenty to say regarding the decor, informing the staff that Heaven is actually much less blue and white than this interior design would imply.

Every patron from the 14th, 15th, and 16th floors had been evacuated from their rooms, which meant a few dozen people were crowded outside the hotel and in the lobby. Police barricading was pointless, but the first thing Chloe ordered to the officers already on scene was to begin taking pictures of the crowds to have sent back to the lab to run facial recognition against yesterday's footage. Hopefully that would save a few more mind-numbing hours of watching security cameras.

As she headed for the stairs, Lucifer immediately began to pout and was just short of stomping his foot before Chloe agreed to get in the elevator instead. Amenadiel followed close but said nothing, his eyes scanning the crowds for something else.

"I will literally kick both of you out of here so fast if you don't behave," Chloe warned as the elevator opened at the top floor to a forensics team swarming the entire hall. Lucifer shrugged with the most innocent grin as he shouldered passed the uniforms, making a beeline for the body. Chloe chased after him as if she would be able to prevent him from tampering with anything he could get his hands on.

"Even more dreadful up close," Lucifer said to Chloe as the pair stared at the corpse before them. The body was posed the same as the picture from the lieutenant's phone: face down in the corner of the room. His name had been Tyler Schultz. His shirt had been lifted over his head by the killer to expose his back, where a curve of business cards for the resort had been affixed to the skin with thumbtacks. Though trails of blood spilled from the punctures, the cause of death had presumably come from a slit in his throat. "The wallpaper, that is."

Chloe mustered a dark look and then reached for a pair of latex gloves to begin her inspection of the room. The time of death was thought to have been just slightly over an hour before. A murder weapon had yet to be uncovered, but the injury was less severe so Chloe doubted it had been the work of a demon blade forged in Hell this time. The fact that she even considered entertaining that as possible in the first crime proved her lack of sleep.

As she gathered all of her observations and facts into her tiny notebook, her train of thought was broken by a glance at Amenadiel and Lucifer. They were both leaned over the dead body, having a quiet discussion, and Chloe shrieked as Lucifer reached out to touch one of the thumbtacks. The room halted and stared at her, but her face burned for only a millisecond. "How many times have I told you, you can't touch _any-_ "

"Let me see the photos of the body from yesterday," Lucifer talked over her, a serious face on for once. The lack of joking earned him a skeptical look but she granted his request, finding an officer with one of the department's iPads. She could barely click on the thumbnails of the photos without getting queasy, but Amenadiel and Lucifer scrolled through them as plainly as if they were reading nothing more than a grocery list. "Just as I thought," Lucifer confirmed to himself and nodded, and the two began having a conversation in mumbles. Chloe was surprised at how annoyed she was to be left out.

"What did you think?" she demanded to know, grabbing the iPad again to see if there was something she had somehow overlooked.

With his hands in his pockets, Lucifer rocked back and forth from his heel to toe. "Well, that's a seven-" he pointed to the pictured wound, "-and that's a six," he finished and pointed to Schultz. Chloe stepped between them to look at the body again and realized that the curve of thumbtacks did resemble a number six, and the lacerations from the day before matched the across and diagonal of a number seven.

She turned back to him, "so, what? This is a countdown?"

"Selecting a seven to start with is intriguing, yes?" Lucifer was talking directly to Amenadiel, which make Chloe clench her teeth. "It's almost like she's alluding to-"

"She who? Your mother?" Chloe forced a harsh laugh and put a hand on her hip. "Lucifer, you don't have any evidence that your mother is out on a killing spree."

"Well, you don't have any evidence that she's not! Or evidence on anyone else, rather, so you may as well hear me out. In my expert opinion, this could be an allusion to the delightful Seven Deadly Sins moniker."

As Chloe raised a brow and then rolled her eyes, Amenadiel drifted out of the room without saying a word. "Lucifer, not everything has to have a biblical connotation. And your opinion isn't expert."

"Just have all of these… _extras_ cross check the two men's backgrounds. Dig into their deepest secrets and sins. When they've crossed paths, who could embody the next…"

"Should I just give you my badge as well, so you can start ordering everyone around yourself?" Chloe was cross, but Lucifer put a firm hand on her shoulder before she could turn away from him. They made awkward eye contact for a few long seconds before his hand returned to his pocket.

"Chlucifer," he stated, still staring her down.

"What?"

"That can be our detective duo name, since you didn't enjoy 'Deckerstar.'"

Fighting the urge to smile, Chloe shook her head.

* * *

"What does this look like to you?"

Amenadiel was surly as he descended the stairs of Lux, glad Mazikeen was at the bar so his planned entrance could be powerful and dramatic. He was holding up his new cell phone, the picture of the potential demon blade forged in Hell on display, though he had to keep tapping the screen to get it to stay illuminated.

As always, Maze had some sort of hard liquor in a chilled glass and she had been watching the end of a baseball game when her visitor had arrived. These days of silence after she had saved his earth life had sufficiently killed any remaining Amenadiel butterflies, so she was completely careless of her sour expression. "A refurbished Samsung Galaxy from 2012," she answered when she glimpsed the phone, then turned back to the plasma TV behind the bar. A lot of those words didn't make sense to Amenadiel, but he could sense the sarcasm.

"The picture, Mazikeen."

Summoning all of her facial ability to seem nonverbally annoyed, she turned again and looked at the phone as Amenadiel set it on the bar top in front of her. She zoomed in by pressing her fingers apart against the screen, and Amenadiel made a mental note to remember how to do that later. After studying the zoom for a moment, she shrugged and did not seem any less annoyed. "A knife? What are you expecting me to say?"

"Is it not a demon blade forged in Hell?"

Mazikeen raised a brow and laughed. "This is your big plan to have an excuse to come talk to me? Show me a picture of a shoddy replica like I'm supposed to feel bad about what happened to you? Look, I fixed-"

"Replica?"

Apparently he did not want to hear the rest of whatever attempt at an apology she was about to make, so she stopped when he interrupted. "It's not one of my blades, if that's what you're asking. I took mine back after... Why, what is this from?"

Amenadiel sat down at one of the stools across from her, looking at the picture again with a sigh. "The detective and Lucifer are on a new case. This was the murder weapon, and he thought it looked like a demon blade forged in Hell."

Mazikeen set her glass down so she could properly drum her long, black fingernails against the bar. "So he thought it was _mine?_ You both have some nerve. I'm here, minding my business, dragging this _stupid_ bar out of the ground for _his_ disposable income, and all the while he's running around solving his human crimes and accusing _me_ of using a divine weapon to waste a _useless_ mortal life!"

Startled by her outburst, Amenadiel sat up straight and shook his head, but her rant continued. He finally put a hand up in hopes of calming her, but it only seemed to infuriate her more. She was seconds away from slapping the hand away before he edged in, "He did not think it was your blade."

Picking up her drink again, Mazikeen snarled and put her other hand on her hip. "No? Does he think there are other demons in Los Angeles leaving their blades in unsuspecting humans?"

Amenadiel was slowly connecting the dots that Lucifer had not informed Maze of the entire situation, and he felt a pang of guilt for not disclosing that his departure from the crime scene had been to investigate Mazikeen on his own. "Well, there was sort of an escape. From Hell."

"'Sort of?' Someone escaped Hell?"

"Someone, yes. Asherah."

* * *

 _in all of this, i lost myself_

 _maybe i'll see you in Hell_

 _okay, whatever,_

 _one man's trash is another man's treasure_

* * *

"trash" property of tyler glenn


	6. This Close

_i had a dream that fire fell from an opening in the sky_

 _someone warned me of this hell, and i spit in his naive eye_

* * *

Lucifer had listened to Mazikeen's complaints regarding being left out of the Asherah situation for about two minutes tops. Then he had simply nodded and twiddled his thumbs with a shameful face. While she went on, he pretended like he was looking engaged in her lecture, but he was really running through crime scene details in his head. The past two days had been tarnished with slaughter, and he imagined he would be getting a call soon for the third if the trend of the spree continued. Though the first murder weapon was inconclusively a demon blade forged in Hell and the second still missing, each crime scene seemed to foreshadow a bigger picture. He just did not know why his mother would go through with all of this, since the fact that she had literally escaped his damnation was threat enough that she was coming after him.

That seemed to be what Maze was droning on about when he tuned back in: that she was here to protect him from pesky earthly matters and not enraged dark beings, that she was no match for that kind of power, and that none of this would be happening had he just gone back to Hell months ago.

As Lucifer was mustering up a boastful lie about how Mum was no match for them whilst out of her element on his Los Angeles terrain, his charming grin fell sharply at a snap of "Lucifer!" from the top of Lux's stairwell. Apparently all of the women in his life wanted a piece of him today.

"Detective!" he greeted Chloe, as chipper as if Maze had not just berated him for a half hour. Chloe was nudging Trixie along in front of her, while the child was scowling and carrying a familiar wine box in front of her. He ignored the child. "A break in the case?"

Chloe was startled that she had actually forgotten to obsess over the case for the last hour. Before responding, she quickly checked her phone to make sure she had not missed an update. Nothing yet. "I just had to pick up Trixie from school. Apparently, she was telling all of the children at recess that they were going to 'burn in Hell.' Care to explain?"

Lucifer raised a brow at Trixie and shrugged. "Well, burning is such an archaic method. We've gotten more creative, I would think, especially with different tools like-"

"Not the point!" Chloe growled and grabbed the wine box from her daughter, setting it atop the bar counter. Maze immediately peered in it, and her heart secretly swelled when she spotted Lucipurr and her favorite jacket. "I let you babysit Trixie for a few hours and now she's spewing your devil garbage to all of her classmates?"

Lucifer was speechless, and Trixie was still glowering. "I resent your citing me as an influence, Detective! We talked very little during my 'babysitting' time, apart from arguing over your _garbage_ dinner options," he insisted, staring at Trixie like he expected her to recant his tale, but she just continued to glare in a way that was just as unsettling as the cat's.

At that moment, Maze went to lift Lucipurr out of the box. The cat was trembling, and the moment Maze set her down on the counter, she bolted off of the bar and across the room. This saddened and mortified Maze. There was something strange about animal rejection, especially because she had thought they had developed a bond when Maze had tended its wound just days before. She wondered if the cat could have forgotten her so easily, or if something else had traumatized the once affectionate kitten. "What did you do to my cat, you little brat?" Maze wanted to claw Trixie's eyes out, but instead ran after the kitty to coax it out from under a table.

"Plus, she told me she hates that cat that you dumped off on us, Lucifer," Chloe continued, putting her hands on Trixie's shoulders and retreating again quickly when the grumpy child wiggled away. "And I know that tiny leather jacket in the box isn't yours, so it looks like you stole Maze's cat?"

Lucifer was dumbfounded. "You played with that mangy creature for ages!" he snarled at Trixie, who only rolled her eyes at him. "This is what I get for trying to be more sensitive?" he phrased it like a question, gesturing to nothing in particular and then reaching across the bar to pour himself a glass of whatever was closest to his grasp.

"You are never babysitting again," Chloe acted stern, as if she was taking a cherished privilege away. Lucifer hadn't completely hated his brief time spent watching Trixie, but he was just as well without.

"Pity," he mumbled into a glass, his gaze drifting to the top of the stairs once more.

Despite that Dan did not want Lucifer and his psychotic Satan antics around his daughter, he was now once again in debt to the man. That did not make it hurt any less that Chloe had let Lucifer take care of Trixie alone, from what he gathered of the end of the conversation he had walked in on. Chloe wondered if she was hallucinating when she followed Lucifer's gaze and saw Dan coming down the stairs, but realized she wasn't when Trixie shrieked her first word since Chloe had picked her up from the principal's office.

"Daddy!" Trixie was squealing, running up to hug Dan around the legs. Lucifer looked away from the pair, swallowing a burning gulp of liquor.

"Everything right as rain," he said to Chloe, who was just standing there with her mouth gaping open.

"How did you…?" she trailed off. Her fuzzy, sleep-deprived brain immediately blamed Lucifer for Dan's bail, and she was still correct despite the tiredness. He supposed after spending time with the small brat, he wanted her to have her _actual_ father around, and so Lucifer's trip to the station the morning before had not been entirely to sit on Chloe's desk and flirt with lady cops. This went unspoken, however, because he supposed he could spare himself the humble brag in order to spare Dan's dignity.

Dan had picked Trixie up and was holding her in his left arm when he reached out to shake Lucifer's hand with his right. Lucifer obliged, his taut face as polite as it could possibly be. "Reporting for work, sir," Dan saluted then, causing Chloe's jaw to drop even more.

"You can't possibly be working here. Lucifer, you hired…?"

"Fired from the force. Lost my badge. My punishment, for, you know," Dan shrugged, trying to keep his tone and head up. Dan thought the investigators had let him off of prison time due to the blackmail emphasis he had belabored for days, but he wasn't naive enough to ignore that Lucifer's persuasion skills had played a roll. That was why he had agreed to take the job as Lux's bouncer with little hesitation when Lucifer had randomly offered the second Dan had been released from the holding cell. That, and to stay close. "Got a mouth to feed while the paperwork settles down."

Dan sent a side-eye to Lucifer, who he expected to gloat. He also expected Lucifer to refer to him as his bitch now, instead of 'Detective Douche.' After all, he was no longer a detective. Instead, Lucifer only sat pleasantly by and nodded at the explanation. Dan couldn't decide which response would have been more grating.

Of course, Chloe only suspected that this assistance was part of a larger scheme on Lucifer's part. She couldn't believe that he had actually had a complete change of heart over Dan due to one occurrence, but the act _was_ chipping away at her resentment and anger toward Lucifer for… well, being Lucifer.

"Seeing as Mazikeen has been raking me over the coals all afternoon, I have yet to inform her of our newest employee," Lucifer spoke up, and ignored Mazikeen yelling 'what a surprise!' from under a table in the background. "So, I suppose you have this weekend off. Why don't you catch up with the little one?"

Though Chloe raised a brow, trying to connect the dots here, she couldn't ignore Trixie screaming "daddy's house! Daddy's house!" at the top of her lungs while she bounced in Dan's arms. Dan turned to Chloe for her permission, and she waved a hand in defeat. "Fine. But not too much fun, okay? No more acting up at school," Chloe was too tired to administer a proper punishment for Trixie's hellacious behavior, and after kissing her daughter on the forehead, Dan and Trixie were leaving the bar.

The way Lucifer was sipping his drink all innocently after that encounter caused Chloe to slap her hand down in front of him. He blinked twice and looked up, his eyes starry and wide. "Yes?"

"Why are you being so nice?" she demanded, drumming her fingertips against the counter deliberately.

Lucifer gasped dramatically and put a hand over his mouth. "Whatever do you mean? Am I not always this benevolent and _sensitive?_ "

Chloe rolled her eyes. "Not without some sort of plan."

Lucifer stood, straightening the front of his suit and beckoning Chloe with his hand as he headed for the stairs. "You caught me. Come with me."

"Where?"

"Come with me."

* * *

Chloe momentarily wondered if she had been drugged as her heavy head lolled forward and she realized she was now standing in an elevator with Lucifer. Then she briefly remembered she had not had anything to eat or drink all day, so her resulting state of mind was literally just fatigue. She felt like she was floating along, which must have been why she did not have anything witty or brash to say as Lucifer opened a door for her and invited her in.

Lucifer had brought Chloe to his apartment, and as seconds passed, he felt he had made the right decision. She was wobbling and he was keeping a close eye, ready to catch her if she passed out. Her energy was completely depleted and though this was not a plan at all, the spontaneous idea must have alluded to some inner compassion he was trying so hard to harness. He would pat himself on the back later.

"What are we doing?" Chloe managed to wonder. Her stubbornness would not allow her to succumb to every temptation she had to collapse on the floor and lay there for eternity.

Silently, Lucifer led her to his bedroom. Chloe stood awkwardly as he drew the window curtains closed, inviting a barrier between the late afternoon sun trying to peak in. "Sleep," he said, sounding like a soft demand. He motioned to his obnoxiously large bed and its perfectly pleated covers, but Chloe shook her head and took a few steps backward.

"No, I don't… I don't understand," her eyebrows drew together and she frowned.

Lucifer sighed through his nose. "You haven't been sleeping. Now, you will lay and not worry and get some sleep."

"I'm fine."

" _Chloe_."

It was startling for Lucifer to refer to her as anything other than 'Detective,' she realized, and supposed that was some testament to how serious he was about her taking a nap in his gigantic, beautiful bed. No longer in control of her legs, she let her bag drop to the floor and flopped down on the edge of the bed like an overdramatic cartoon, no longer able to fight the lead lining her eyelids.

After figuring out how to remove her shoes, Lucifer carefully lifted Chloe into the bed properly and tucked her under a cover. He then rifled through her bag to make sure her cell phone was turned off and nothing would wake her. Amenadiel was in the kitchen when Lucifer shut the door to the bedroom behind him, smirking at his brother with an out-of-character deviance. Lucifer gave him the finger and fixed himself a drink.

* * *

When she awoke, Chloe was frightened. Her sleep had been amazing. She had been dead to the world for however long, and once the panic subsided and she remembered where she was, she realized that she felt refreshed. She had stayed awake so long because she was afraid of nightmares, but her nap here had been dreamless and heavy. Through the curtains, light was dim and gave the entire room an iridescent glow. An expensive analog clock on one of the walls showed a small hand nearly reaching a roman numeral V. She had actually slept for over twelve hours, longer than she had in the entire last week combined. With the warmth of Lucifer in the vicinity, she had not worried.

The bed was large enough that Chloe had not been stirred whatsoever at whatever point Lucifer had joined her to sleep during the night. His back was to her and his bare shoulders were apparent, but the blanket they had unknowingly been sharing covered from his torso down. She felt her face grow warm wondering if he slept naked.

Unable to fall back to sleep, Chloe curled onto her side and found herself staring at Lucifer's back. The scars against his shoulder blades stared her back. His angel wings. Though she would never admit it, it was this exact moment that she finally accepted to herself that Lucifer truly was the devil. Though it seemed like a notion that should strike fear, after everything, this conclusion seemed to release a knot in her heart, like a breath she had been holding her entire life.

Despite herself, Chloe reached out and pressed her index finger to the back of his neck. Her finger followed the notches of his spine and stopped between the scars. Lighter still, she just barely grazed her fingertip over one of the scars. The brief contact was enough to awaken Lucifer, who immediately flipped to lay flat on his back and grabbed her wrist. Their following eye contact was different now. Sharp, passionate. Though she was unable to blame the fatigue any longer, Chloe leaned in and pressed her lips to Lucifer's.

Lucifer had held tightly onto reservations regarding anything romantic concerning Chloe. It had happened once he realized her effect on his vulnerability. Though he talked it up, after thinking back, he had trained himself to avoid even the smallest contact from her. He would not hug her. His small pats on the shoulder were awkward and forced. But with his lips engaged, eyes closed, and body ignited, everything disappeared but her.

Lucifer still had a hold on her wrist, but Chloe did not try to struggle. Quite the opposite, in fact: she was pretty sure she was melting into him completely. It became a silent battle of passion, though with matched heat, the actions were synchronistic and neither overpowered.

Chloe was embarrassed at her disappointment that Lucifer had worn undershorts to sleep in, but once he had released her arm and she had turned on top of him, it was a matter of seconds before articles of clothing no longer became an issue at all. His comforting hands wandered her skin freely, knowing the exact places to pinch and caress to elicit moans from the very bottom of her belly, though they were immediately lost into Lucifer's mouth.

Some rebellious, former version of Chloe Decker would hate how easy it was to come to orgasm with him. She had promised both Lucifer and herself that she would never, ever sleep with him, but something strange had shattered inside. She was done withholding. She gave in completely.

* * *

 _i don't know who i am anymore_

 _not once in life have i been real,_

 _but i've never felt this close before_

* * *

"this close" property of flyleaf


	7. Hermit the Frog

_i went to the doctors believing_

 _the devil had control over me and_

 _i was finding it hard to breathe and_

 _finding it hard to fight the feeling_

* * *

When she awoke, Chloe was frightened. Her sleep had been amazing. She had been dead to the world for however long, and once the panic subsided and she remembered where she was, she realized that she felt refreshed. She had stayed awake so long because she was afraid of nightmares, but her nap had been dreamless and heavy. Through the curtains, light was dim and gave the entire room an iridescent glow. An expensive analog clock on one of the walls showed a small hand nearly reaching a roman numeral VII, and she was experiencing a fuzzy deja vu.

Her hands grabbed up to her chest, where her blouse was buttoned to her neck. In fact, the only disturbance to her previous day's outfit was that her shoes were elsewhere, and a corner of her blouse had come untucked from the waist of her pants. This caused her to blush, as she vividly remembered the graceful way Lucifer's large hands had discarded every stitch of fabric from her body, but she did not recall getting redressed.

Lucifer was asleep next to her, his back exposed from the covers as he lay on his side. It was like nothing had happened. If she listened closely, she could hear his deep breathing ending in a quiet snore.

Chloe curled onto her side and found herself staring at Lucifer's back. The scars against his shoulder blades stared her back. His angel wings. Her hand was shaking as she entertained the deja vu and reached forward, her three fingertips pressing to the back of his neck. She was holding her breath as her fingers traveled down, just barely touching the top of the scar.

In an instant, Lucifer's eyes flipped open. He reached back and grabbed her wrist, then turned to protect his back against the mattress. His eyes were furious when they contacted hers, but softened when he saw her brief look of terror. "Don't," he said plainly, and slowly let go of her wrist.

Chloe nodded and pursed her lips, glancing at the analog clock. She must have been disorientated. She fingered the collar of her blouse as Lucifer stood, the covers dropping from him and revealing his ass, clad in a fitted black boxer short. It was too late to look away, as once he turned toward her, he caught her staring. "What?" he asked, a mischievous grin becoming him. "I do prefer to sleep in the nude, but I thought I would express some modesty so as not to disrupt your slumber."

Clearly, Chloe's brain had short-circuited or something, as she continued staring at his face and chest with an odd, empty expression. Her lips formed to make words that didn't come out, giving the appearance of a confused goldfish. "What!?" Lucifer asked again, forcing a laugh, though he was growing more uncomfortable by the second.

"How long did I sleep?" she finally asked, though that wasn't the first question on her mind by a long shot.

"All afternoon and evening. Out like a light. Had to check your breathing a few times," Lucifer was only joking, but the way she was gaping at him made his skin crawl. "I'm kidding! You were left completely undisrupted."

"And you just woke up now?"

"Well, yes. After you… you know. Why?"

Chloe sighed and shook her head, pulling out her messy bun so she could retie it into a neater ponytail. "Nothing," she came to a conclusion. "I just had a weird dream."

"About me?" Lucifer seemed overly pleased as he pulled a white t-shirt on and rummaged through his closet for pants. When he was met with silence, he looked at Chloe again, who only looked away and shrugged. Lucifer gasped and then let out a hearty laugh, covering his mouth with two fingers. "Did you have a dirty dream about me, Detective?"

Chloe's entire face was burning. "No."

"You did!"

"I did not!"

"Was I good?"

"No!"

"Bit defensive, are we?"

"Stop," Chloe held a hand up in finality and looked around desperately for a distraction. She had a fleeting thought about work which turned into widened eyes, springing up from the bed and searching for her bag. "Where's my phone?" she asked, frantic. She found her bag with her shoes at the end of the bed and dove into it, waiting impatiently for the phone to turn back on once she pressed the power several times.

"You needed to sleep," was all Lucifer said as he buckled a belt around his waist; the main thing on his mind was choosing which sport jacket was most functional yet still classy for the day's activities. She was of no good to a criminal investigation with bags under her eyes.

"People are _dying_ , Lucifer. I can't not answer my phone for like, twelve hours," she was almost in tears, beginning the scroll through all of her missed texts and calls. Once this case was over, she was so getting fired.

"I'm sure you didn't miss anything," was the only somewhat comforting response Lucifer could think of. Chloe almost threw a shoe at him.

"We missed a person of interest apprehended," she retorted, emphasizing his inclusion in this despite herself. She held her phone out to wave a photo of the suspect in his face, which just looked like a blob of colors from the way she was shaking it about. "No more days off," she said as she crammed her shoes on. The last part would become her mantra.

"It was a few hours off," Lucifer corrected, and he was going to point out that she was still wearing the same outfit as the day before, but knew he would be left behind if he didn't shut up and follow.

* * *

"Are you joking?" Lucifer held back a laugh once he had swindled his way into the interrogation room with the suspect. The kid couldn't have been more than 18 years old, terrified and on the edge of vomiting. "This is our suspect?"

Chloe followed and shut the door, cup of coffee in one hand and files in the other. Despite shoving a dry bagel in her face moments before, the coffee was still making her jittery. "Not a suspect. We just have some questions," she insisted, sympathizing a bit with the red headed boy sat opposite from her. She could see his hands shaking, though the handcuffs kept them together. "James, is it?"

"Jimmy," the boy replied, his posture significantly dipping when he glanced at Lucifer. Lucifer didn't react, his pompous air enough to intimidate the teenager.

"Jimmy," Chloe repeated with a nod. Lucifer stayed silent beside a chastising grin at the boy. During the whole drive to the station, Chloe had been busy with her phone and would not even look at him. He was rather frustrated that none of his caring activities had warranted the gratitude he was searching for, and he felt like he was in time out. He supposed he would watch his tongue and let things ride out for this session, always a challenge for him.

"Do you know why we had to bring you in this morning?" For some reason, Chloe could not avoid the gentle mom voice she had not had to use since Trixie was a toddler.

"No." Jimmy's response was in the tone of an aggressive toddler, so her tone was appropriate.

Though she sympathized, Chloe was not giving him the benefit of the doubt if the other officers had had enough suspicion to bring him in. She fingered through her file and notes for two photos and placed them in front of Jimmy. The first was a screenshot timestamped from Wednesday, before the murder of Dick Whibley. It was hotel camera footage of a boy who looked to be Jimmy, holding a black plastic garbage bag on his way out of the very stairwell where the body had been found. The second photo was from the following day: Heaven's Waters. Security footage placed a boy of the same description toting a black plastic garbage bag out a back door. Retrieval of the garbage bags had become a dead end, because the trash pick up service on both days had conveniently already carried away the potential evidence. "We have recognition of someone matching your description at two different crime scenes in the past three days."

Jimmy looked over the pictures, his face pale. Upon staring him down closer, Lucifer assessed Jimmy's tongue was twitching in his mouth to come up with the most believable lie. "I work there," he stated finally, swallowing hard.

"You work where?" Chloe prodded for specifics.

"At The Grand." He was referencing to the hotel, and pointed to the accompanying surveillance photo from that scene. "I'm a janitor. So I was taking the trash out."

"So you _are_ confirming this photograph is you?"

It looked as if Jimmy had not realized he could have denied the screenshot was of him. The face was blurry, and the major descriptor matches had come from the height, hair style, and black garbage bag in both scenes. While Jimmy did match the height provided by the police software and sported curly red hair as well, he might have been able to buy himself more time had he denied it entirely. With Lucifer now lingering behind his chair like a shark out for blood, he finally spit out a tiny "yes."

Chloe made a note to check his employment records and then tapped on the photo taken from Heaven's Waters. "Do you also work here?" Though she was avoiding using the names of the locations, earlier officers had extracted him from Heaven's Waters' employee break room this morning once the footage had been compared against their staff listing.

"No," Jimmy denied it, wondering if it was too late to use this tactic.

"Then why were you taking the trash out there as well?"

"I wasn't."

"Are you saying the first photograph is of you, but the second is not?"

"Oh, go on with it, Detective," Lucifer blurted out, startling both Chloe and the suspect. "He was taking the trash out at his job. Case closed, as far as I'm concerned. Not our guy. Look at him, he's a miserable, depressed teenager." Jimmy wriggled in his handcuffs again, attempting to cover self-inflicted cuts that scattered both of his wrists. Chloe noticed the cuts also and her stomach churned, but her following glare at Lucifer was interrupted by a chime on her phone. A text. Another crime scene, with the victim on the way to the ICU.

"Lucifer," was all she said as she stood up and grabbed her notes, cocking her head to the door. Lucifer raised a brow before chuckling dryly.

"Another victim, I presume? And you were in here interrogating this poor kid for nothing."

With a quick word to the suspect that he would be free to go once he spoke with another officer, Chloe dragged Lucifer out of the room by the elbow while punching the coordinates of the hospital nearest to the crime scene into her phone's maps application. Though there were many unanswered questions with Jimmy, she had to reach the latest victim before it was too late.

* * *

Martha Hendricks was unsurprisingly the CFO of Thread Again, a booming thrift store chain that planned to open seven more locations in the southern California area before the year's end. The retail slot was competitive, even for this secondhand format, and Martha had spent countless hours and sleepless nights on the phone with executives as she clawed her way to the top by the skin of her manicured nails. Getting stabbed was almost a relief, as if she finally had an excuse to take a day or two to herself. She was floating by on pain medication administered by a hospital IV while the doctors decided the extensivity of her wounds. Her eyes were closed in a peaceful sway of consciousness, like the back and forth of the wooden swing her father had built for her on the biggest tree in their childhood backyard. She could almost feel him pushing on her back as her blood pulsed, unaware one of her injuries was causing this delusion.

"Martha Hendricks," a female voice interrupted her peace, so her look was cross when she opened her eyes again. The voice was rushed and panicked, belonging to a run-down looking blonde accompanied by a well-dressed male counterpart. Martha wondered if she had ever looked that terrible while at her job. A woman in a position of authority had to remain poised and perfect at all times. After three years of calls, talks, one night stands, backstabbing, and favors, Martha had learned the ways of being a successful woman in business. This girl could learn from her.

A doctor tilted Martha onto her side to dress the wounds on her back, so she had no choice but to focus her eyes to Detective Decker, who had introduced herself vaguely.

"Do you know where you are?"

Martha smiled and nodded, which sent a searing pain through her neck. She winced and tried to return her thoughts back to the lovely swing.

"Do you know what happened?"

She had been stabbed, she knew that much. Pain was returning the more she tried to answer the Detective's questions, so she decided to stop trying. The sun was beating down on her face. She could feel a slight breeze as she swung back and forth, causing a smile to return.

"Do you have any enemies?" The male voice prompted, and Martha's smile faded once more. It was no longer her father lovingly pushing her back on the swing of this fantasy. It was a girl she recognized but could not place, who withdrew a blade to bury in her back each time the swing moved fro. This happened a total of four times. The swing stopped dead at the fourth, and then the girl sliced across Martha's neck. This disturbed her enough to muster the last of her energy for an answer to the man.

"A little girl," Martha choked as things and machines around her started beeping and buzzing. "A little girl."

Next, the sound of doctors yelling accompanied blackness. Martha's fantasy ended, as did her life.

* * *

 _well, i want to tell you a secret_

 _you can take your double standard love and keep it_

 _i can't help the devil likes to make my heart a double bed_

 _and i can't help he sometimes likes to come and rest his little head_

* * *

"hermit the frog" property of marina and the diamonds


End file.
